“ The wise man shows his wisdom in separation, in gradation, and his scale of creatures and of merits is as wide as nature. The foolish have no range in their scale, but suppose every man is as every other man. What is not good they call the worst, and what is not hateful they call the best. ”
Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nature (1836). copy citation
| Author | Ralph Waldo Emerson |
|---|---|
| Source | Nature |
| Topic | separation wisdom |
| Date | 1836 |
| Language | English |
| Reference | |
| Note | |
| Weblink | https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Nature,_Addresses_and_Lectures/Nature |
Context
“Therefore is Space, and therefore Time, that man may know that things are not huddled and lumped, but sundered and individual. A bell and a plough have each their use, and neither can do the office of the other. Water is good to drink, coal to burn, wool to wear; but wool cannot be drunk, nor water spun, nor coal eaten. The wise man shows his wisdom in separation, in gradation, and his scale of creatures and of merits is as wide as nature. The foolish have no range in their scale, but suppose every man is as every other man. What is not good they call the worst, and what is not hateful they call the best.
In like manner, what good heed, nature forms in us! She pardons no mistakes. Her yea is yea, and her nay, nay.
The first steps in Agriculture, Astronomy, Zoology, (those first steps which the farmer, the hunter, and the sailor take,)”
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